Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE: A) today announced a solution for exon analysis based on SurePrint G3 Exon Microarrays. The solution provides a major expansion of Agilent's portfolio of gene expression reagents, microarrays and bioinformatics systems. This new system, available in mid-November, enables researchers to examine alternately expressed exons according to recently updated content, providing a global picture of RNA expression.

"We're continuing to fill out our gene-expression workflow with high-performance, cost-effective tools from RNA isolation kits through data interpretation and validation," said Sharoni Jacobs, Ph.D., Agilent product manager, Gene Expression. "In December we introduced the Low Input Quick Amp labeling kit, which requires only 10 nanograms of total RNA. Last May, we launched the third-generation SurePrint G3 Gene Expression microarrays, which include both coding and non-coding RNA targets on a single array."

Agilent is leveraging the performance and density of the SurePrint platform to provide a full-exon solution to help researchers discover the relationships between approximately 30,000 genes and more than 100,000 proteins.

"Exon level arrays represent a significant step up in our ability to interrogate the genome in greater detail than traditional 3 prime biased arrays," said early access user Stuart Pepper, head of the Cancer Research U.K. Molecular Biology Core Facility at the Paterson Institute for Cancer Research, The University of Manchester. "Our initial work with these arrays has shown that we can obtain very clean data which will facilitate the detection and quantitation of alternate transcript expression."

Like all Agilent microarrays, the SurePrint G3 Exon solution delivers a wide dynamic range to detect low expressors and high expressors to accurately represent the range of expression levels and provide high confidence in the results.

Agilent provides the industry's widest selection of gene expression solutions, offering a comprehensive portfolio with the highest array sensitivity, a proven and reliable qPCR platform, and an integrated software solution that streamlines the workflow, all with a focus on quality results.